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Thursday, March 8, 2012

Owl's Head

Perched on the widow’s
walk overlooking Rockland Harbor, Amanda peered into the twilight. Mother
Nature was angry. The ocean roiled violently, and the horizon blazed; ignited
by the explosion of lightning bolts against its onyx backdrop. Her husband Tad
feared heights. He never joined her here high above sea level. She didn't care,
she enjoyed the solitude.

Amanda watched Tad scramble
below boarding up the lighthouse windows, securing against the wrath of the
late autumn nor’easter. Crazy bitch,
he thought as he spotted her. Sick and tired of her, Tad just couldn’t deal
with her looniness any longer. Assuring him of her sanity, she begged him to
believe her, insisting she had the visions ever since she could remember, only
they had become more vivid and happened more often. Tad accused her of
suffering from delusions and hallucinations. She agreed to see her doctor to prove
him wrong; get him off her back. In addition, she enjoyed her time with Dr.
Kirkland; he listened to her, validating her concerns.

Stumped after months of
extensive tests and numerous physical and psychological exams, Dr. Samuel
Kirkland lacked a finding. He needed some sort of prognosis, something to
report to Tad so he falsely concluded Amanda suffered from Brief Psychotic
Disorder. He explained to Tad the duration of episodes of psychosis normally
ranged from one day, up to one month with eventual full return to normal level
of functioning. To sum it up, he wanted to help Amanda and lied hoping to buy
time to find the underlying cause of her possible precognition. Six months into
her episode, Tad complained to her doctor the antipsychotic drugs prescribed
had not managed her symptoms. A good actor, for she wasn’t taking any meds at
all, she put her foot down refusing to take more medication.

Tad glared up at her
and shouted harshly. “I’m boarding up the door next, so if you don’t want to be
stuck up there until the storm passes you’d better get down here now.” Amanda descended the
spiral staircase of the grand lighthouse. The Owl’s Head Light, one of only a
few remaining functioning lighthouses in New England, was located at the
entrance to Rockland Harbor in West Penobscot Bay, in Maine. Hired to work on
the restoration of Owl’s Head, upon completion Tad landed the job as
groundskeeper and maintenance man. The old keeper’s residence now housed the
base for the United States Coast Guard, who shouldered the responsibility for
the care of the lamp itself. This would be their home until the renovations on
the cottage they rented just north of the light were completed.

When they returned to
the keeper’s cottage the place was deserted. The entire Coast Guard crew deployed
no doubt due to the severity of the storm. Amanda glanced at the photo of the old
sea captain and his wife. Taken many years ago the picture made her skin crawl.
She had freaked out the first time she laid eyes on it. A dead ringer for the
captain’s wife Lydia, Amanda’s ghostly
image shocked the crew when they met her.

The couple who had haunted
her for years, repeatedly appearing in her mind’s eye now stared back at her
from a gilded frame. This photograph was the proof she needed to convince Tad
she wasn’t psychotic, but as usual he brushed off her notions as delusional, by
product of her illness.

Tad fell asleep in the
big chair in front of the television watching an old John Wayne movie. Frustrated,
Amanda left him where he sat and went to bed. Moments later Tad found himself
glancing up the exterior of the lighthouse. How the hell he got there, he
didn’t know. As he tried to make sense of it all, he saw her standing on the
widow’s walk.

“Amanda!” he yelled, but
she did not respond.

A thin layer of ice
coated the stair treads, railing and walls of the only means of getting to the widows
walk. He shook his head in disbelief. She loved the view, but how did she get
up there? Cautiously, Tad climbed the stairs. When would this insanity end? He
was angry. Tired of her shenanigans he toyed with the idea of divorcing her, or
maybe she would just disappear. You know, fall off the widow’s walk, never to be
seen again. He was tempted; the idea had occurred to him more than once.

He called to her as he
reached the platform and she turned toward him. The woman staring at him
resembled Amanda but…she had the look of death in her eyes, ashen skin, and salt
water dripped from her soaking wet hair down to her feet. Amanda was dead, just
as she predicted she would be, by the seaside. How could this be? She claimed
her death would take place by the ocean and she was right. He’d misjudged her;
she hadn’t lost her mind after all. Not delusional as he thought her to be, Amanda
possessed a gift. Her visions were in fact premonitions.

Believing she was dead,
an unbearable guilt flooded him. It ripped through him worse than anything he’d
ever felt. He covered his face and whimpered. “I’m sorry for not believing in
you Amanda. I am so very sorry,” he cried. He took ownership of her death and stepped
to the edge of the widow’s walk. He grabbed the railing and hurled himself over
the side.

Amanda leaned over the
rail and smiled. “The coast is clear,” she announced, watching as the waves
tossed Tad’s mangled body like a ragdoll, smashing it against the jagged rocks
below. Dr. Kirkland emerged from the shadows. He placed a tender kiss on her lips,
pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, and wiped the make-up off Amanda’s
face.

She felt no grief; no
tears shed on Tad’s behalf, only relief. She was free.

Poetry

Quinn Cullen

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About Me

I am a multi genre author. My writing includes paranormal romance/erotica, horror and poetry. A long time New England resident, I feel fortunate to be living in an area that affords me the privilege of all four seasons, enjoying the fringe benefits the different climates have to offer. In awe of its overwhelming brute force and mystique, my favorite place on this wonderful earth is by the ocean.